Dear Friends,
On this 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, let us each acknowledge the invitation from Jesus to follow Him closely as a disciple, mindful of one condition – to remain steadfast in carrying the cross. In the First Reading, Jeremiah tries mightily to avoid bearing the cross that would be required of him. Consumed by love of God, he comes to the realization that without the cross, there can be no discipleship. In likewise submitting to His will, might we experience that same fire burning in our bones, that longing for a new life to which we are called. Let us thank God for this difficult lesson.
Please continue to be faithful to the 54-Day Rosary Novena, even if you have to pray it alone.
Religious Education registration for your children and grandchildren is on the home page of our website, www.stjohnviera.org. Let us bear this responsibility joyfully, consumed by the love of God.
Have a Blessed Week!
With love, Fr. John
Ecclesia De Eucharistia
For this week, we shall reflect on paragraphs 18 and 19 of the encyclical “Ecclesia De Eucharistia” (The Church draws her life from the Eucharist) by St. John Paul II on the vital role the Eucharist plays in the life of the Church:
- The acclamation of the assembly following the consecration appropriately ends by expressing the eschatological thrust which marks the celebration of the Eucharist (cf. 1 Cor 11:26): “until you come in glory”. The Eucharist is a straining towards the goal, a foretaste of the fullness of joy promised by Christ (cf. Jn 15:11); it is in some way the anticipation of heaven, the “pledge of future glory” (Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ, Second Vespers, Antiphon to the Magnificat). In the Eucharist, everything speaks of confident waiting “in joyful hope for the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ”(Missale Romanum, Embolism following the Lord's Prayer). Those who feed on Christ in the Eucharist need not wait until the hereafter to receive eternal life: they already possess it on earth, as the first-fruits of a future fullness which will embrace man in his totality. For in the Eucharist we also receive the pledge of our bodily resurrection at the end of the world: “He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day” (Jn 6:54). This pledge of the future resurrection comes from the fact that the flesh of the Son of Man, given as food, is his body in its glorious state after the resurrection. With the Eucharist we digest, as it were, the “secret” of the resurrection. For this reason, Saint Ignatius of Antioch rightly defined the Eucharistic Bread as “a medicine of immortality, an antidote to death” (Ad Ephesios, 20: PG 5, 661).
- The eschatological tension kindled by the Eucharist expresses and reinforces our communion with the Church in heaven. It is not by chance that the Eastern Anaphoras and the Latin Eucharistic Prayers honor Mary, the ever-Virgin Mother of Jesus Christ our Lord and God, the angels, the holy apostles, the glorious martyrs and all the saints. This is an aspect of the Eucharist which merits greater attention: in celebrating the sacrifice of the Lamb, we are united to the heavenly “liturgy” and become part of that great multitude which cries out: “Salvation belongs to our God who sits upon the throne, and to the Lamb!” (Rev 7:10). The Eucharist is truly a glimpse of heaven appearing on earth. It is a glorious ray of the heavenly Jerusalem which pierces the clouds of our history and lights up our journey.